The invention relates to an overhead conveyer comprising an endless draw member traveling along a stretch, said member being provided with pick up claws mounted at regular distances between them, which claws can be adjusted from an active (closed) position to a non-operative (open) position and vice versa for transporting or dropping respectively of a carrier hook suspended in a claw, the hook being of the type in which one side is closed such as a coat-hanger, which conveyer comprises a number of throw off stations each being provided with means for opening a passing claw, each of said stations further being provided with a catching rail mounted in a diverging manner as seen in the direction of travel, the tongue at the free end of the rail lying under the path traversed by each of the claws at least during the throw off operation.
Such a conveyer is known in practice and serves for sorting out garments suspended on a carrier hook or coathanger. These coat-hangers are supplied at a feed station and should be selectively discharged at a number of throw off stations. The catching rails used in that known conveyer can only be present on one border or bank of the conveyer, viz. the border to which the open side of each carrier hook is directed. The application of catching rails on the opposite border of the conveyer is impossible, as the carrier hooks would then jam on that rail. Until now one has accepted this limitation which however is not conducive for the compactness of the installation.
The invention aims at furnishing a provision with which carrier hooks with garments may also be discharged towards the opposite border of the conveyer at the location of one or more throw off stations. According to the invention this aim is realized in that the tongue of the free end of one or more catching rails is displaceable between two positions: the catching position (A) in which the tongue of the free end is lying within the path of the carrier hook and a discharge position (B) in which the tongue is lying completely outside the path of the carrier hook.
Due to this feature, the pick up claws comprising a carrier hook are capable of passing along said catching rails. The tongue of this rail only enters into the path of the carrier hook after its displacement into the catching position. Upon the activation of the means for opening a passing claw near that station, the carrier hook can be freed from the claw and will fall along a short distance downwards in order to be catched by the tongue of the catching rail. Hereafter this tongue will be displaced to the discharge position. In this position the following pick up claws of the conveyer are able to pass without disturbance (jamming) while the catched carrier hook is able to slip along the concerning catching rail towards its destination.
Preferably the displacement of the tongue at the free end of each movable catching rail from its catching position towards its discharge position comprises not only a sideward component, but also an upward component. Due to this feature, the catched carrier hook can more easily slip by means of gravity along the concerning catching rail. Moreover one obtains that during a quick displacement of the free end of the concerning catching rail, a risk exist that this rail, due to occuring inertia forces is --as it were-- pulled out under the carrier hook without taking along this hook (with the garment).
The features discussed in the preceeding portion of this specification, as well as further particularities of the overhead conveyer according to the invention, will be explained more in detail with the aid of the accompanying drawings which give a schematic picture of this conveyor and of the most important parts therefrom.